Dead Men Walking

The Walking Dead Makes an Irresistibly Perfect Song Choice

This post contains vague details about The Walking Dead Season 7, Episode 2 “The Well.” Nothing mind-blowing or revelatory here, but proceed with caution if you want to be wholly unspoilt.

Back in May when they started production on Season 7, The Walking Dead producers couldn’t have known that Bob Dylan would get a surprising Nobel Prize nod in mid-October. (Unless those sneaky devils traded info on who Negan would kill for a quick peek at the Nobel short list?) So let’s just call it a crazy coincidence that mid-way through Season 7, Episode 2 the earnest and kind residents of The Kingdom break out into a mellifluous, a cappella version of Dylan’s “Don’t Think Twice It’s All Right” right when the world is re-hashing Dylan’s legacy.

The song kicks in right as a couple of familiar faces—Carol and Morgan—try to figure out how they fit in this new peaceful (for the most part) community. So, yes, the lyrics which Dylan wrote for his then-girlfriend Suze Rotolo who decided to prolong her stay in Italy (away from Dylan) indefinitely—are a little on the nose. The Walking Dead might as well have played “Should I Stay or Should I Go” by The Clash. The pertinent section is as follows:

Well, it ain't no use to sit and wonder why, babe Even you don't know
by now And it ain't no use to sit and wonder why, babe It'll never do
somehow

When your rooster crows at the break of dawn Look out your window, and
I'll be gone You're the reason I'm a-traveling on But don't think
twice, it's all right.

And it ain't no use in turning on your light, babe The light I never
knowed And it ain't no use in turning on your light, babe I'm on the
dark side of the road

But I wish there was somethin' you would do or say To try and make me
change my mind and stay But we never did too much talking anyway But
don't think twice, it's all right.

Still there’s something irresistible about the song, which Dylan actually based on a folksy public domain traditional melody called “Who’s Gonna Buy Your Chickens/You Ribbons When I’m Gone?“ The old-timey tune may not be an exact time period match for the feudal system King Ezekial has concocted in The Kingdom, but it certainly recalls simpler times for Carol and Morgan.

Now the real question is will Bob Dylan ever acknowledge that the most popular show on television used one of his songs? The Nobel committee would probably advise AMC not to hold its breath.

SEASON 1: The first time we’re introduced to a cheeky good-natured pizza delivery boy named Glenn (and his adorable baseball cap), he goes out of his way to riskily save Rick, who gets himself stuck in a military tank surrounded by walkers. His rescue proves successful but leads to Glenn and his group being helplessly surrounded by an endless horde of walkers after their gunshots become the closest thing to a dinner bell for these angelic little flesh-eaters. It’s only when Rick creates a makeshift camouflage of walker guts that they make it out alive.

Photo: Courtesy of AMC.

SEASON 2: A bloated well walker resembling Jabba the Hutt almost kills Glenn and simultaneously makes everyone lose their lunch. Haven’t there been enough horror movies with creatures in wells for all of us, Glenn included, to know better?

Photo: Courtesy of AMC.

SEASON 3: One of the more heartbreaking moments of the show is when Glenn and Maggie are taken hostage at the Governor’s base and separated from one another, with Glenn left to assume the worst about Maggie. And if things couldn’t get any worse, Merle releases a particularly nasty-looking walker on Glenn, who quite literally has his hands behind his back, tied down to a chair. In true Glenn form, he manages to escape, releasing the loudest He-Man roar of the season.

Photo: Courtesy of AMC.

SEASON FOUR: With an ominous virus plaguing the prison, Glenn falls ill, leading to a scene where Maggie finds a blood-gurgling and barely conscious Glenn. He’s eventually saved by a Hershel-meets-House M.D. moment.

Photo: Courtesy of AMC.

SEASON 6: After following Nicholas outside Alexandria’s presumably safe borders, Glenn gets shot right in the shoulder, is almost beaten to death by Nicholas and eaten alive by a walker . . . but still he survives. You’d think Glenn would seek true Walking Dead justice by finishing off Nicholas, but he allows Saint Nick to go on a path of redemption, which never really ended up working in Glenn’s favor.

Photo: Courtesy of AMC.

SEASON 6: The pièce de résistance! Just when we were ready to get out our tissues and metaphorical pitchforks to throw at our TV screens (and at Nicholas), Glenn went ahead and Jon Snow-ed us in the best way possible: Surviving hundreds of walkers under Nicholas’s manflesh, further confirming that even walkers are simpleminded selective eaters that only eat what they want to.

Photo: Courtesy of AMC.

So where does this leave us? Though there’s some [murmuring] (http://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2015/11/walking-dead-negan-jeffrey-dean-morgan-glenn-lives) going on that Glenn’s continuous revivals may be running out of luck, we will continue to hope for the best. Keep on, keeping on, Glenn. (We also deserve one more guitar performance from you at the very least.)

Photo: Courtesy of AMC.

SEASON 1: The first time we’re introduced to a cheeky good-natured pizza delivery boy named Glenn (and his adorable baseball cap), he goes out of his way to riskily save Rick, who gets himself stuck in a military tank surrounded by walkers. His rescue proves successful but leads to Glenn and his group being helplessly surrounded by an endless horde of walkers after their gunshots become the closest thing to a dinner bell for these angelic little flesh-eaters. It’s only when Rick creates a makeshift camouflage of walker guts that they make it out alive.

Courtesy of AMC.

SEASON 2: A bloated well walker resembling Jabba the Hutt almost kills Glenn and simultaneously makes everyone lose their lunch. Haven’t there been enough horror movies with creatures in wells for all of us, Glenn included, to know better?

Courtesy of AMC.

SEASON 3: One of the more heartbreaking moments of the show is when Glenn and Maggie are taken hostage at the Governor’s base and separated from one another, with Glenn left to assume the worst about Maggie. And if things couldn’t get any worse, Merle releases a particularly nasty-looking walker on Glenn, who quite literally has his hands behind his back, tied down to a chair. In true Glenn form, he manages to escape, releasing the loudest He-Man roar of the season.

Courtesy of AMC.

SEASON FOUR: With an ominous virus plaguing the prison, Glenn falls ill, leading to a scene where Maggie finds a blood-gurgling and barely conscious Glenn. He’s eventually saved by a Hershel-meets-House M.D. moment.

Courtesy of AMC.

SEASON 4: When Maggie and Glenn are separated after escaping the prison, The Walking Dead tries to fool us into thinking that Maggiehad discovered a dead Glenn in a school bus full of the infected. Turns out it was just any old dark-haired zombie, and Glenn was actually still at the prison, alive and king of the walker-infested hill.

Courtesy of AMC.

SEASON 4: Glenn and an injured Tara enter a dark tunnel o’death on their way to Terminus to find Maggie by any means necessary, finding themselves swarmed with zombie groupies. At the very last second, Glenn and Tara are reunited and saved by Maggie, Bob, and Sasha.

Courtesy of AMC.

SEASON 5: Cannibals! Cannibals, galore! Rick and everyone else find out their safe haven at Terminus is actually, naturally, a human butcher shop. Right when it’s Glenn’s turn to have his lights out, Carol launches a full-fledged heroic attack and saves everyone.

Courtesy of AMC.

SEASON 5: And thus begins Nicholas’s path of endless destruction. Here we lose Noah, who sacrifices himself in order to save Glenn in a graphic revolving door scene. All of this after Nicholas leaves the two stuck between a rock and a hard place.

Courtesy of AMC.

SEASON 6: After following Nicholas outside Alexandria’s presumably safe borders, Glenn gets shot right in the shoulder, is almost beaten to death by Nicholas and eaten alive by a walker . . . but still he survives. You’d think Glenn would seek true Walking Dead justice by finishing off Nicholas, but he allows Saint Nick to go on a path of redemption, which never really ended up working in Glenn’s favor.

Courtesy of AMC.

SEASON 6: The pièce de résistance! Just when we were ready to get out our tissues and metaphorical pitchforks to throw at our TV screens (and at Nicholas), Glenn went ahead and Jon Snow-ed us in the best way possible: Surviving hundreds of walkers under Nicholas’s manflesh, further confirming that even walkers are simpleminded selective eaters that only eat what they want to.

Courtesy of AMC.

So where does this leave us? Though there’s some [murmuring] (http://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2015/11/walking-dead-negan-jeffrey-dean-morgan-glenn-lives) going on that Glenn’s continuous revivals may be running out of luck, we will continue to hope for the best. Keep on, keeping on, Glenn. (We also deserve one more guitar performance from you at the very least.)